


When the Battlefire Cools

by GhostCwtch



Series: JaegerconBingo Fills [9]
Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Aftermath, Angst, Brotp, Gen, Mourning, Nightmares, canon character death, implied PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 23:32:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/919335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostCwtch/pseuds/GhostCwtch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They light a beacon for the dead every night for a year.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Battlefire Cools

**Author's Note:**

> My Jaegercon Bingo fill for "Aftermath"

They light a beacon for the dead every night for the first year. With so many dead, it takes longer than that to total up the loss of life, but there is only one loss symbolized in that light for Raleigh.  
  
Drifting with Mako has helped, really it has, but he doubts that he'll ever fully recover from Yancy's death. Having the set of memories of losing him would be bad enough, but to experience the terror and pain of being lost? No. He'll be old an grey (and isn't that a novel idea) and still be turning to tell Yancy a joke or thought or story and still be brought up short by the empty place where his brother should be. It'd be worse without Mako there. Smaller, yes, but stronger in all the ways that Raleigh didn't appreciate until he discovered that those are his weak points. She makes sure he never has to wake up alone, twisted in sweat drenched sheets until he feels like they're choking him.  
  
He'll never be able to thank Marshall Pentecost for giving them their chance.  
  
They light the beacon every night for a year and every news station plays some kind of memorial broadcast, as if they can all move on and the world can go back to the way things were before if there's enough media coverage. He and Mako do half a dozen interviews and press appearances and answer the same questions over and over and over again.  
  
 _What was it like to go through the breach?_

  
_Do they remember anything from the world on the other side?_

_Do they think the kaiju will be coming back?_

_What is it like to pilot a jaeger solo, Mr. Becket?_

She is his strength, shoring him up with quiet deliberation, fielding questions on his final mission in Alaska that he will never be able to answer. He's starting to understand what she meant about respect. He would do anything she asked of him, and it's nothing to do with obedience. 

It's been a year and they're all still living in the Hong Kong Shatterdome, all the ones that are left. Civilians don't, can't, understand what it was like to be a part of that last desperate stand. It's been a year and he and Mako sleep curled together like puppies, clinging in the night. He wakes her when she cries and calls for her sensei in a voice more reminiscent of the girl she was than the woman he fights beside. She holds him when he jolts awake screaming for Yancy with his scars pounding and burning like the wounds are fresh.

 

It's been a year and they're still barely getting through the days.


End file.
